Filmmaker Marc Radomsky is third generation South African. His grandfather emigrated from Lithuania to escape pogroms. The family established their roots in Johannesburg and prospered. However Marc and his wife see that growing lawlessness and crime in post-Apartheid South Africa has driven the white community into gated communities where armed guards, attack dogs and barbed wire are the brutal signs of the need for increased security.

Marc and his wife Vivianne have made the painful decision to emigrate to Australia. Their close-knit family, threatened with separation, tries to prevail upon the couple to reconsider. The camera captures the painful unravelling of their interconnected lives. Their parents will now be deprived of participating in the lives of their grandchildren, and their sobbing seven-year old tries to grasp why he must leave his dog behind.

But leave they do, to an apparently welcoming new country, and hopefully a brighter future. Choosing Exile is a portrait of some of the current conditions in South Africa, as well as an intense portrait of the pain of emigration.

New York Jewish Film Festival, 2003
St. Louis Jewish Film Festival, 2003
Metro Detroit Jewish Film Festival, 2003
Vancouver Jewish Film Festival, 2003
The Golden Olive Tree, Kalamata, International Film Festival, 2003
African Studies Association, 2003